Ego Operor Quis Volo
by ToryTigress92
Summary: Spy AU. All Human. Lokane. Loki Odinson has been leading a hidden life for ten years. But the emergence of an enemy with an obsessive grudge brings old, dark secrets into the light, ones which will change his life forever, as he fights to save his family, his life and the life of his brother's estranged wife, Dr. Jane Foster.
1. Duty Calls

Ego Operor Quis Volo

Warnings: None.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

_**A/N: **_**You can blame the trailer for 'Skyfall' for this. That, and Tom Hiddleston in a tux.**

* * *

'_Let the sky fall,_

_When it crumbles,_

_We will stand tall,_

_Face it all together,_

_At Skyfall.'_

_'Where you go I go,_

_What you see I see,_

_I know I'd never be me,_

_Without the security_

_Of your loving arms._

_Keeping me from harm,_

_Put your hand in my hand,_

_And we'll stand.'_

_**- 'Skyfall', Adele**_

* * *

_6__th__ December, 1981_

_A remote area of Soviet Russia._

_0400 hrs._

_The harsh icy wind blew through the pines, the only trees capable of surviving the harsh Arctic winters. Nonetheless, to the black-clad SAS commandoes slowly and stealthily making their way towards the barbed wire camp, it still seemed like the trees shivered from the sheer cold._

_The Gulag had long been shut down, but its presence still lingered in the Russian countryside. The KGB still needed remote places to imprison and interrogate suspected traitors and captured enemy spies._

_That was what they were here for. One of the KGB's nastiest interrogators and counterintelligence operatives had picked up one of MI6's deep cover operatives in the Politburo. The information he had, and knew about others in MI6, was too valuable to allow their man to simply die an unglorified death at the hands of KGB interrogators._

_Their assault was quick and smooth. They were the world's best._

_They took out the guard with sniper rifles then cut the barbed wire. Once inside they split into two squads, one to disable surveillance and the computer systems, the other to retrieve the prisoner. _

_In cell block D, in the basement of the main building, was the interrogator's suite of rooms. After checking every cell, and not finding their man, Alpha Squad OC approached the last door._

_The cells had been a nightmare, even for his battle-hardened eyes. The KGB interrogators were sadistic, and not afraid to use harsh methods to torture their victims, as long as they still had a mouth to talk with. _

_The guards were dead, most of the prisoners were dead or dying, but their man was not among them, and neither was his captor. He pulled open the last cell door; hope already died in his heart, but then he was a professional, that never mattered. _

_And stopped dead._

_Inside the cell, on a makeshift cot, was the figure of a woman, in ragged prison uniform, but most harrowing of all was that the only signs of life came from the starving, pale, wailing child in her arms. The mother was dead._

_He lowered his rifle, and stepped warily inside, cautious of traps or any hidden targets in the shadows of the cell. It was freezing cold._

"_Hey, Raven? You alive down there?" his radio comms buzzed into life. He tapped it absentmindedly. _

"_Yes, I'm alive," his voice husky, but refined, the voice of a British aristocrat. "Tell the boys…we have a new mascot."_

_He shouldered his rifle, and then bent down, scooping up the tiny baby in his arms. The mother's dead eyes stared up at him, almost pleadingly it seemed._

_He read their message clearly. __**Look after him.**_

_The child was a boy, with tufts of dark hair and green eyes that blinked up at him, as he slowly stopped crying. He smiled, stroking the boy's cheek, and the baby smiled._

_He had a boy at home, a year old. Thor, after the Norse God. _

_He'd like a baby brother. _

_Opening his jacket, he tucked the baby inside, sheltering him from the cold. With an impersonal glance at the dead woman, now bereft of her treasure, he leant down and closed her eyes, and then left the cell, the door clanging shut behind him with all the finality of a tomb._

* * *

_20__th__ July, 2012_

This was it. This was really it.

He'd been sent into enemy territory in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Iraq, Qatar, Russia, South America and China. He could fight off hordes of opponents with his training and particular brand of ruthlessness that his instructor at the MI6 training compound in the Falklands commended him for. He'd faced death hundreds of times before.

But now…any second, he, Loki Odinson, MI6 agent, Commander in Her Majesty's Royal Navy, was going to crack.

From sheer boredom watching his elder brother drinking down pint after pint of lager as his friends cheered him on. The idiot.

It wasn't that he didn't love his brother, he did, but sometimes the blonde muscle-bound hulk was a real idiot.

He was using that word a lot.

His close colleague and subordinate, Sif Jaimeson, a loyal Lieutenant of the Logistics Corp, attached to Thor's unit. And far more personally, now as well, to Thor.

Nine months before, Thor had separated from his wife, Jane, after a difficult tour of duty, and Loki had never forgiven him. He had liked Jane, enjoyed her company and conversation. Unlike his brother, she could actually talk about something other than guns and grenades. He had never understood what she'd seen in his brother.

Things had been strained after the separation, especially when Thor confided in Loki that he was seeing Sif now, and was planning to divorce Jane. The bloody idiot.

Sif was beautiful, but as superficial as his brother to Loki. She liked the same things he did, enjoyed the same hobbies, and believed the same ideals. Hell, what was he thinking? They were perfect for each other.

Not that it justified the way Thor just dumped Jane. It still made Loki's teeth grind to think about it, and he never usually cared. He could think of a dozen reasons why he cared, but he wasn't in the mood to dissect them tonight. He knocked back his very good vintage whiskey, and sighed as Thor beat Fandral at yet another drinking game.

He longed for the excuse of a mission to get away. He watched from the outskirts, as he always did, and while usually he relished his skill to observe and remain unseen, it depressed him that night, for some unknown reason.

He was getting soft. With a disgusted grimace, he looked down at his watch. 8 pm.

They'd be going for hours yet.

Surreptitiously, he slid from his seat at the bar. It was Thor's 32nd birthday, and while he wished his brother well, he didn't want to be there now.

"And where do you think you're sneaking off to?" his mother's voice echoed knowingly behind him, and he rolled his eyes before turning to meet her. She stood behind him, graceful and lovely in her pearl coloured dress, flaxen mane loose and curly. Still youthful, still beautiful in Loki's eyes, at the age of fifty.

"Work, Mother," he smiled. "I have a large stack of reports calling my name and a meeting with the Defence minister in the morning."

* * *

His official cover was that he was an adviser and representative of the Royal Navy to the Ministry of Defence, a post he'd 'held' for five years.

He'd been working for MI6 for a decade.

He loved his job. Unlike Thor who was too loud and brash to be so subtle, he enjoyed the thrill and danger of his work behind enemy lines. He carried a military rank, but he had never served in the Navy. He'd been recruited at 21, graduating from Oxford with a 1st in Politics and Arabic. His talent with languages and natural gift at being able to fade into the crowd made him attractive to the MI6 recruiters. He'd signed up with barely a moment's thought.

He hadn't needed to. Ever since he was a child, he had felt a burgeoning need to prove himself to his father and to Thor. His father, a seasoned ex-Army General in his sixties, was a stern, uncompromising man, and when he had confided he had joined the Navy, as per his cover, the disapproval that had radiated from him had almost physically hurt.

As for Thor…his brother joked it was an easier life anyway, so why the hell not?

No one could know who, or rather what, he really was. He was protecting his country in a way Thor could never dream of doing, and some days he ached to yell it from the rooftops, but he never did. Because father would never approve of him working for MI6, nor of his work as an international operative.

Like many of his generation, passed down from father to son, the General looked down on spies and the Intelligence Services as cowards who didn't dare face a fair fight. Thor shared that view.

After ten years of doing the job, Loki had convinced himself he'd stopped caring.

* * *

This all rushed through his mind, as he felt his Blackberry vibrate in his pocket. With an apologetic glance at his mother, he fished it out and his breath rushed from him in relief. Work.

Or rather, duty called.

"Sorry, Mother. Duty calls," he told her, with a kiss to her cheek. Frigga sighed but let him go.

"Take care on the drive back to London. The roads are wet this time of year," she replied, and he hid his instinctive need to roll his eyes.

"I'll be fine," he sighed.

"You would be if you used a car instead of that infernal contraption!" she snapped, but only teasingly.

"It's not infernal. It's a motorbike," Loki retorted. He liked his bike.

"Just wear a helmet," she hugged him once, before glancing back towards Thor and his half-drunk gaggle of friends. "I'll tell him you said goodbye."

Loki sent her a grateful smile, before slipping quietly and invisibly out of a side door. As he strode towards his bike, the vehicle gleaming in the twilight, he quickly sent a text; simply detailing he was on his way and not to worry about dinner.

His standard operating procedure. He would be expected, and the briefing ready for him by the time he made Thames House in London.

As he strapped on his helmet, flicking down the visor, he felt a surge of anticipation.

Duty called, and he answered.


	2. The Game Is Just Beginning

Ego Operor Quis Volo

Warnings: None.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

* * *

_21__st__ July, 2012_

_La Belle Rouge Casino, Paris, France_

_2000 hrs._

Once, when he was a still green, only just field-rated agent, it had amazed him how quickly he could go from the briefing room to the middle of some far-flung, exotic location. Now, however, it didn't affect him at all, and he was far from green anymore.

The casino, built on the ruins of a former mansion overlooking the Champs Elysees, mimicked the decadence and opulence of the 18th Century, Dom Perignon flowing like water, slender flutes of it nestled in the hands of women dripping in jewels and satins while their men gambled at the tables.

Loki moved through the crowds silently, a ghost in an exquisitely cut tuxedo. Tonight he was blonde, his naturally dark hair lightened by dye. The golden hue browned his skin, made him appear less pale.

Tonight he was playing the part of a businessman, young, cocky and drunk on his own success. Just the type to gamble away a fortune in a casino and not worry about it until his bank manager called.

The assignment was simple. Meet the contact, exchange information, make payment, leave. Simple, quick and easy.

Loki was certain his alias would be allowed an anticipatory smirk at the thought of the night ahead.

Of course, if he just so happened to pick up a lovely companion for the night, so much the better.

With that view in mind, he made his way to the bar, eyes seemingly wandering aimlessly, but far from the truth. He took in every exit, every blind spot, the number of security guards, and then the not so overt security, the only sign of their presence the all-too telltale bulges under the armpit of their tuxedo jackets.

The bar was already packed but Loki sidled his way, pausing beside a glamorous red-head, curls restrained, slender legs displayed by the sheer black gown she wore, as she lit a cigarette impatiently, trying to catch the bartender's eye.

"Excuse me!" she snapped, her New York accent drawling over the syllables. "Who does a girl need to screw to get a drink around here?"

Loki grinned and raised his hand, catching the bartender's eye. "A Black Russian for the lady!"

"And a Bourbon for the gentleman," she added, with a sideways smirk at Loki. "You remembered."

"Always. Now about whom you need to screw…." He trailed off, as she shifted on her stool to face him, the cigarette dangling from her fingertips, lit but unsmoked. He lowered his voice as he took the stool next to her, leaning in so his lips grazed her ear. "No husband this time?"

"Hawkeye's in Antigua. I'm a widow again," she murmured, with a flick of a curl and a seductive smile. "Here on business or pleasure?"

"Oh, always both, my dearest Natasha," Loki grinned, a familiar note of lust seeping into his voice as he regarded the former Russian agent. Freed from a terrorist stronghold in Georgia at the age of ten, Natasha Romanoff had been working for FSB then the CIA as a freelance ever since. Loki had worked with her several times, enough to have become comfortable with one another in more ways than one.

Her operational partner, Clint Barton, call sign: Hawkeye, was another good friend and colleague. Often, the pair would pose as husband and wife when on assignment; hence Natasha's favourite joke being that she was widowed whenever he wasn't partnered with her.

Although both were far more experienced than he, Loki worked well with them, and vice versa. So he was grateful that he would have the infamous Black Widow at his back tonight, at least.

"Well, down boy. Business comes first," Natasha patted his shoulder, before downing her drink in one go. "Our friend? Is he here?"

"Five minutes," Loki replied, sobering slightly now his mind was back on the assignment. The Bourbon burned his throat, focusing his mind as he stood from his stool, offering his arm to Natasha gallantly. "Shall we?"

As they walked through the crowd, Loki glanced down at her dress, clinging, sheer from the top of her thighs down. "Did you actually manage to get a weapon in that dress? Or was there not enough fabric?" he asked, a touch sarcastically as she grinned.

"You know me, Loki. I prefer to get up close and personal," she breathed, pausing for a moment to press against him teasingly.

Loki just smiled and shook his head.

They paused at a balcony, looking down on the roulette and blackjack tables below, the golden chandeliers gilding everything below them, lending the proceedings below an almost unearthly glow, as if reflecting the greed and decadence of the games being lost and won in its aura.

"Table Seven," Loki murmured, eyes scanning the crowd, Natasha's narrowing in on their target.

"Grey jacket, red tie," she breathed. "Just bet on red. Tut, tut."

"So black is our lucky colour tonight?" he retorted, watching her.

"Always. Let's go," she muttered, leading him unobtrusively down the winding, ornate staircase, draped over him like any other opportunistic gold-digger there tonight.

Natasha took a place at the table, while Loki collected some chips, courtesy of Her Majesty's Treasury and the United States Federal Government. They placed one million on the black, and Natasha gave a loud shout of joy when it came up.

A tall, pale man with a heavy Ukrainian accent, resplendent in his grey suit and red tie, leaned in with a smirk. "Your luck is good tonight, friend."

"Ah, but that was only the first throw," Loki replied, giving the pass phrase, as the Ukrainian's eyes shone with relief. "Vassilov."

"Prince," he inclined his head, giving Loki's callsign, the only identification they gave to their contacts and double agents embedded in terrorist organisations. "Widow."

Natasha inclined her head just once, haughtily, before turning her attention back to the table, her eyes scanning the crowd for any suspicious activity.

"Laufey is here," Vassilov hissed, passing Loki a folded note. "He's expecting a big payment. Ten million, dropped on a blackjack table in one of the private rooms. 407."

* * *

Loki felt a thrill of anticipation ripple through his gut, but he held it back. He, personally, had been chasing the ex-KGB turned terrorist for five years, for the bombing of the British Embassy in Moscow, among other crimes but the ruthless former assassin and interrogator had been chased from country to country since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1990.

He was notoriously cunning and evasive, hence why no one had been able to catch him. Loki had come close on numerous occasions but always he slipped from his grasp, like a snake made of smoke. It was almost as if he was teasing Loki, taunting him to come out and play for a much longer, greater game. He had every intention of playing.

Something, however, niggled. "Laufey would never be so stupid as to come in the open," Loki murmured quietly, as Natasha nodded absentmindedly, listening in even as she kept watch. "It'll be an intermediary."

"No, no, I tell truth," Vassilov protested in a furious whisper, his grasp of English deteriorating as he grew distressed. "Laufey is here, he is here!"

"Either way, we can apprehend him," Natasha whispered, with a flirtatious smile in Loki's ear, leaning in slightly as she pointed to the game. "If it's an intermediary, we catch and interrogate him for more leads. If it's Laufey, we bring him in. We win, either way, it might take a little longer one way or the other."

"As the lady wishes," Loki smiled, before turning to the game and sliding a chip from his pocket, surreptitiously handing it to Vassilov. "Put it on the red. 10."

The game was fixed. One way of getting Vassilov's payment to him inconspicuously. Ten million, not a bad rate for a week's reconnaissance work.

"Come along, sweetheart," Loki turned away, Natasha on his arm, his hand drifting over her shapely bottom, ignoring her pinching the inside of his wrist.

"I'm definitely getting you back for that later," she muttered warningly, as he chuckled.

"I'm just in character, darling, no more, no less," he replied with a flash of a smile, and she rolled her eyes. A moment later, they heard a triumphant shout, and applause as the next game finished. Neither looked back.

* * *

Until the screaming started.

Loki spun, his eyes quickly flicking to where their contact lay sprawled out, dead, a single bullet wound bleeding out in-between his eyes. Natasha's eyes scanned the crowd, before fixing on a lone gunman, ignoring the screaming masses around him.

"Up there, behind the pillar, sixth from the staircase!" she hissed, and Loki moved, Natasha barely a step behind him as they pushed through the crowd.

Their assassin fled, but Loki dodged one last screaming employee, and jumped up, grabbing the edge of the balcony and pulling himself up and over.

"Move!" he shouted, as he sprinted after Vassilov's killer, Natasha pausing to throw away her heels and unhook the Beretta strapped to her thigh, Loki going for his own gun. "Out of the way! Move!"

The assassin smashed through an employee access door, and onto a fire escape, as Loki followed, Natasha catching up as they reached the bottom of the stairwell. They ducked backwards as a hail of gunfire met them, Natasha returning a few as Loki squinted through the smoke.

"He's getting away!" he snarled in frustration, before going for the coil of high-tensile wire hidden in his belt. Unclipping the belt buckle, he slipped it around both his and Natasha's waist, before gathering his strength and lassoing the buckle around one of the upper stair rails. The magnetic clamps kicked in immediately, holding on tightly to the metal railing. Natasha covered them as they ascended the stairwell, Loki catching hold of the railing, as they detached and hauled themselves over.

"You never cease to amaze me, Odinson," she hissed, as Loki chuckled.

"Always full of them, Romanoff," he replied, as they rushed after their assassin.

"Full of it, is one way of describing you," Natasha chuckled. "Is there anything else in that belt I should be worried about, or was it a one trick wonder?"

"Careful, you'll hurt Q Branch's feelings," he retorted, as they reached the top, to find the door jammed. With a gesture, he turned to Natasha. "Ladies first."

With a grin, Natasha spun and flicked her leg out, the deadly move with enough force to break someone's neck, smashing the door open, the sound reverberating through the stairwell.

"Remind me never to make you mad at me," Loki muttered quietly, before cocking his gun and leading the way out.

* * *

The Paris night was awash with sirens and shouting, as the cacophony inside the casino spilled out onto the street. The casino was surrounded by much larger buildings either side, and Loki just spotted the assailant, tall, pale and clad in a grey tuxedo, throw himself over the edge, grabbing hold of a fire escape on the closest building. Loki threw himself after him, Natasha always at his side, not bothering to waste bullets as the assassin paused every so often to throw some heat their way.

Amateur then. A professional wouldn't have wasted time taking potshots.

The alleyway below them was pitch-black but for the streetlamps at either end, one leading towards the main square, the other to a smaller one that led off into the many, labyrinthine streets of Paris.

"Which way?" Natasha hissed, as they jumped the last level to the street. Their assassin had disappeared, and Loki snarled under his breath.

Just then, they heard a gunshot, coming from the smaller square and they both sprinted towards it without thought, keeping their weapons fixed on all the potential exits and lines of fire.

The square was small, barely lit, surrounded by shops and cafes, long closed for the night. They both paused as they saw the figure lying on the ground, blood leaking from a bullet wound to the chest.

Loki checked the surrounding windows and rooftops, before cautiously edging out into the open, gun at the ready. But no shot came.

Sure enough, their assassin lay there, dead. Nondescript and plain, apart from the expensive tuxedo, Loki would never had looked twice at him in a crowd.

He also didn't recognise him from the list of Laufey's known associates and employees. Definitely an amateur then.

And from the look of it, he was merely bait too. Laufey was never at that casino, he was never going to that casino. It had all been bait, to ferret out the informant.

But why not kill him before? Why so publicly? A warning to other informants possibly lurking in his organisation's ranks?

Natasha interrupted Loki's reverie, as she bent down, carefully extracting a crumpled note, lying on the dead man's lapel.

_Nice try, son. Better luck next time._

Loki growled once, before crumpling the note in his fist. With a jerk of the head he turned away. "Come on. Let's go."

As quickly and quietly as the shadows they lived in, they disappeared into the night.

* * *

"Well, that was a waste of time," Loki hissed, once they made his hotel room. Natasha unstrapped her Beretta, throwing it on the table with a sigh.

"The intel was sound. We had no indication Vassilov was compromised," she retorted. "So quit beating yourself up over it."

Loki snarled at that, yanking his curtains shut, before shedding his jacket and throwing his gun down beside Natasha's. "We're going to get hell for this," he rubbed his face, running a finger along his top lip. "What I don't understand is why. We know Laufey's usual MO for getting rid of informants, and this doesn't fit the bill. Why so publicly, in so risky a way? Even if his sniper hadn't got rid of the assassin, we could still have caught up with him."

"Which was exactly why there was a sniper," Natasha pointed out, removing her stockings and rubbing her sore, bloodied feet from their pursuit. "We both know I could have had him talking in minutes."

"You always do," Loki smirked, eying her appreciatively, as he sank into a large wingback in the living area. "Have you informed Fury yet?"

"I sent him a preliminary report," she replied lightly. "I'll brief him fully when I get back to Washington. You?"

"H is already snapping at my heels," Loki sighed. "He didn't even give me a chance to file a preliminary report. How the hell he knew, I don't know."

"He sees and knows all," Natasha joked, before straightening up with a coy smile. "Well, my flight isn't until midday tomorrow, so we have twelve hours to kill."

Loki's smile deepened, as lust rose again. After the failure of the night, he needed a way to work out his frustration, and he guessed, despite her easygoing attitude, so did Natasha. "What do you suggest, my dear Black Widow?" he asked huskily, enjoying the conscious shudder that ran down her lithe figure.

Her smile was every bit as seductive and knowing, as she shrugged and walked towards the bathroom. "I need a shower. Care to join me?"

Loki uncrossed his legs, and with a dark grin, followed her into the bathroom.

* * *

In a warehouse halfway across the world, a figure stood in the darkness, his face barely illuminated by the laptop screen open in front of him.

He was like a black hole in the echoing, cavernous room, sucking in all light so he was nothing, not even darkness within darkness, as the screen showed images of a tall, blonde haired man in an exquisitely fitted tuxedo, gun in hand, the infamous Black Widow at his side.

The blue light of the laptop screen showed only one thing; the slow, sly smile of anticipation spreading across his face.

At last. After thirty-one years, at last his vengeance was within his grasp.

His voice echoed, rough and accented, across the warehouse, to the lackeys waiting just within the shadows, like worshippers fearfully and reverently awaiting their god. "Make ready. We leave tonight."

"Where, Sir?"

"Why, England, of course. The game is just beginning."

* * *

_**A/N: **_**So just a little update if you'd thought I had forgotten this one. I never will, I just have a lot on my plate.**

**So you've got action, intrigue, a little hint of BlackFrost (Don't panic. It's not the main pairing for this story), and hopefully you enjoyed it :)**


End file.
